ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Food Sci. Technol.
Sec. Food Biotechnology
This article is part of the Research TopicBioactive Peptides in Functional Foods: Production, Characterization, and Health BenefitsView all 3 articles
Microbial γ-polyglutamic acid (γ-PGA) incorporation into muffins: Impact on physicochemical, functional, and textural properties
Provisionally accepted
- 1Pondicherry University, Puducherry, India
- 2National Institute of Nutrition (ICMR), Hyderabad, India
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This study investigated the effects of gamma-(γ)-polyglutamic acid (γ-PGA) on the physical, structural, and sensory properties of muffins. γ-PGA polymer, extracted from Bacillus valezenis M-E6, was incorporated into muffin batter at concentrations ranging from 0.2% to 1%. The volume index of muffins was increased to 104 with γ-PGA (0.6%) compared with the control muffins (without γ-PGA, 95.3). The viscosity of control batter was 12648 mPa·s, whereas for γ-PGA batter, it was 14845 mPa·s. The antioxidant activity of the muffin increased from 6% to 41% when incorporated with γ-PGA, which makes it a functional muffin. Textural profile analysis revealed the best texture for muffins containing 0.6% γ-PGA, characterized by the lowest hardness (1508 g), which was half that of muffins without γ-PGA, along with improved cohesion and springiness. Also, a decrease in lightness (L*) and an increase in redness (a*) were observed in muffins with γ-PGA. γ-PGA muffins received higher overall acceptability scores than the control in the sensory evaluation. Incorporating γ-PGA improved the physical, textural, and sensorial properties of muffins, making it a promising natural ingredient for enhancing the quality and shelf life of baked products. These results suggest that γ-PGA not only improves the texture and quality of muffins but also benefits moisture retention and shelf life, aligning with consumer preferences for natural and sustainable food ingredients.
Keywords: γ-Polyglutamic acid, Muffin, Texture Analysis, sensory, Cooking yield, stalingstudy, antioxidant
Received: 11 Aug 2025; Accepted: 30 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Manika, Devi, Reddy, Kavitake and Shetty. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Digambar Kavitake, digambarkavitake@gmail.com
H Prathap Kumar Shetty, pkshalady@yahoo.co.uk
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